Study Finds Link Between Music and Preschoolers Reading Readiness

Results support continued funding of music education, researchers say

“Administrators need to better understand the importance of the arts to children’s development. We hope this research will help music educators and childhood educators support their requests for music time for the youngest of our students.”

Maria Runfola, Associate Professor of Learning And Instruction

BUFFALO, N.Y. – New research from the University at
Buffalo Graduate School of Education shows a link between preschool
music activities and the development of reading and writing skills
in children.

Funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts and
published in the Bulletin for the Council of Research in Music
Education, the two-year study examined the impact of "musically
trained" early childhood teachers on the music and emergent reading
and writing achievements of preschool children.

In the study, 165 preschoolers participated in music activities
taught by 11 teachers who had received intensive training in
musicianship skill and teaching strategies for guiding young
children's music development.

The results showed that music instruction significantly
increased children's oral vocabulary and grammatic understanding,
after controlling for students’ age and prior knowledge, and
was especially effective for children who began with lower literacy
skills.

“First, we found that the musicianship of the early
childhood teachers improved as did their ability to guide music
activities in ways that enhanced student music development,”
said study co-author Maria Runfola, UB associate professor of
learning and instruction. “In addition, the researchers found
statistically significant links with two tests of early literacy
development: oral vocabulary and grammatical
understanding.”

The study results were mixed for music achievement,
however. Students’ median scores were similar for
the experimental and control groups on use of singing voice.
Students' tonal pattern achievement in the experimental group was
significantly higher but no significant differences were found in
children's rhythm-pattern achievement, the study found.

The researchers say the results provide the first link between
music and literacy when music instruction is provided by
“generalists” – regular classroom teachers in
pre-kindergarten and daycare centers.

Other researchers have shown pre-kindergarten students can make
gains in emergent literacy and other developmental domains when
they are taught by music specialists who have received formal
training in music education.

“Music is one way that children can learn rhythm and rhyme
of text, be exposed to new vocabulary and learn to discriminate a
variety of sounds,” says Runfola.

National educational organizations such as the National Reading
Association recommend “playful experiences” as ways to
make these pre-kindergarten children more ready to read, Runfola
pointed out. This new study clearly shows the association between
music and traits that can make it easier for preschoolers to learn
language skills, she said.

The study grew from Runfola and co-lead researcher Elisabeth
Etopio’s beliefs in the importance of early childhood music
development and that early childhood specialists could be taught to
guide music learning in ways that also increased their
students’ development in literacy. Etopio is visiting
assistant professor in UB’s Graduate School of Education.

The study pointed out that school districts increasingly are
focused on test scores in math and literacy, often at the expense
of appropriate music experiences for students.

“More and more, music educators are being asked to address
other domains of student learning in addition to music-making and
listening,” the report stated.

Runfola is concerned that music programs in New York State are
being cut due to Race to the Top requirements and the focus on
“Common Core Standards.”

“Administrators need to better understand the importance
of the arts to children’s development,” Runfola said.
“We hope this research will help music educators and
childhood educators support their requests for music time for the
youngest of our students. Children need daily appropriate
music activity to stimulate their neural activity to develop tonal
and rhythm audiation that in turn appears to help their emergent
literacy skill.”

Parents should take note of these results and encourage their
preschoolers to listen to a variety of music from recordings and
especially in live venues, according to Runfola. Moreover,
parents should interact with children musically, in the same way
they interact with them using spoken language. At a minimum,
they should chant nursery rhymes and dance with them to music on
radio, TV and recordings.